On a lonely night
By the lake, perhaps,
You may hear a quiet
Wave that slaps
The sand
Of a distant beach.
This lap of the shore
Lasts a minute or more.
But then you hear
A sudden breach
In the rhythmic taps
On the darkened beach...
An inconsistence
In tandem
With something random.
No rhythm or rhyme
To these ripples in Time
That come and go
Now fast,
Now slow,
Spasmodic,
Chaotic.
No one consults
This irregular pulse
From a lake like glass
That ought to pass
On nights like these
In total peace.
But as you are here,
The lake brings
To your ear
A mystery
Something
Wants you to hear
In the lapse
Of these laps.
A loon
Now laughs
At the moon, perhaps,
A laugh like a jeer.
Nothing’s humorous here.
Is it laughter... or fear...
That you
And the lake
And the loon
And the moon are
Something lunar?
Something askew...
In the lake... or in you?
The loon seems insistent
Nothing’s consistent,
And the lake explains
There’s only change,
Laps then lapse,
Lapse then laps.
Everything alters,
Morphs, and melts;
Everything’s changing
To something else.
It’s an untimely dance
Of change and chance.
But, if all is flux
And perturbation,
There can’t be any
True cessation.
The lake’s advice?
Perhaps it’s nice
You can’t dip your toe
In the same lake twice.
Things rise.
Things fall.
Things change.
That’s all.
Horrific or Lucky?
Both and either are true;
The metaphysics
Is up to you.
A soul may adjust
To laps AND gaps;
Serenity
Bridges both, perhaps.
The lake has a bed,
The loon her nest,
And even you
Must come to rest.
But it’s not an end;
It’s just a breach,
A lapse in the laps
On a distant beach.
A simple pause
Neither lake nor shore,
A nothing
Which soon will be more
As the pulse of ripples
Resumes on the strand
Like a string that’s plucked
‘Twixt the lake and the land,
Mysterious... strange...
As the laugh of a loon
Shone down upon
By a heretic moon.